Andi had been playing with Mr. Fork and Mrs. Knife, putting them to bed between two chopsticks.
You know, she said, this isn’t the most fascinating conversation we’ve ever had.
Andi, I said, before she could elaborate, let the grown-ups finish their conversation, then we can find something you can talk about, okay?
It’s late, Ahmad said. I think it’s time.
He was right. Andi was tired, so Ahmad flew her home like a 767 jet.
10. A FAIRY TALE
It was a typical weekend. Ahmad took Andi to Coney Island to satisfy her ambition to ride the Cyclone six times without throwing up. The outcome of this venture was an Andi-Ahmad secret, but the stain on the front of her jumpsuit told all. Sunday, Andi and I went to the Natural History Museum to look at lizards, then had ice cream at Cohn’s Cones (my Cohn’s Cones koan: Does a hot dog have a Buddha nature? Hers: What is the sound of one cone dripping?). Sunday night, Ahmad went for sushi with a clutch of conservatives, remnants of a once-powerful cabal of Republican advisers, displaced by the warming of the Cold War. They still got together to drink sake and make jokes about Nancy Reagan’s astrologer.
Andi was starting school in a week, so she and I were at her closet going through her clothes. When my phone rang, she ran to my room, wearing only her tights, Mary Janes, and day-of-the-week underwear. To retrieve my phone, I thought; in fact, to answer it.
Hello, she said, before I could take the phone from her. She must have thought it was Ahmad. I shook my head. No! She listened a moment, then handed me the phone, disappointed.
Who is this? Romei asked.
Hello? I said. It’s Shira.
Who is this child who answer the phone?
My daughter, I said.
Not that it’s any of your business, I thought.
You have a daughter? I know nothing about a daughter. How old is this daughter? What is this daughter name?
Andrea, she’s seven, almost eight.
Silence.
The name of your husband?
I am happily single, I said.
Silence.
She is healthy, this Andrea? (He pronounced it in the Italian style: Ahn-drey-ah.)
Very.
Long silence.
I may speak to her?
Weirdo.
I looked at her, my sweet, beautiful thing with her straggly braids and impatient expression.
Mo-om, she said. I’m tired! It’s time for bed!
It was an hour before Andi’s bedtime. I put up a finger — one moment.
Maybe some day she tell her friends she talk to Nobel laureate.
Make it quick, I said.
Andi accepted the phone with a quizzical look.
Who is this? she said.
I tried to move my ear toward the phone, but Andi turned away and started nodding seriously, as if Romei could see her. Okay, she said finally and handed me the phone.
What did you say to her? I asked.
Andi put her hands on her hips.
Mo-om! she said.
She is very intelligent, this Andrey-a.
I wasn’t sure if this was a statement or a question. I assumed the former, though she hadn’t said a word. Maybe when dealing with Romei this was a sign of intelligence.
Of course, I said, and looked at her proudly. Very intelligent.
She rolled her eyes again, and plopped onto the bed with a humph.
So you may tell me about Vita Nuova, please.
Vita Nuova? What do you want to know? and gave Andi a look that said, Patience, my precious.
Whatever seem relevant, he said.
Deep breath. Was he testing me? Would I really have to sing for my supper?
Vita Nuova …, I said. I’d discoursed on the topic just a few days before, but now, talking with the Great Man, my mind was a blank.
College fund, braces, Barbie Dream Palace.
Vita Nuova poses a number of problems for the conscientious translator …
Bah! Romei said. I am caring nothing for this! What is making you feel, this book?
Andi was holding a dress up to her front, a frilly one she knew I hated.
Feel? I asked stupidly. I don’t feel anything when I translate.
This I think is not true. I think you are not liking this work.
Devil!
I like it okay.
Miss Greene, if we are to work together we must be making one agreement.
Yes?
Andi was swirling pirouettes, dancing with her frilly dress. I smiled.
Just one minute, I whispered to her.
Full disclosure!
Full disclosure?
Yes! Full disclosure. You don’t like this libello, is okay! We are friends now, you tell me.
I don’t know …
You do not like. I know this.
Okay. You’re right: I don’t like Vita Nuova. Dante says his book is about love, but as far as I’m concerned, he knows nothing about love! He never gets close to Beatrice! He stares at her, he worships her, when he’s very lucky, she says hello. He’s in love with an idea, not a person! Love is something he experiences only in his imagination.
You think love is not something we experience in the imagination?
You know what it reminds me of? I said, ignoring his question. It reminds me of poets who translate other poets, not because they’re interested in the original, but because they want to turn it into something that looks like them. Dante says his world revolves around Beatrice, but in fact, it revolves around him — his longing, his words, his precious emotions. You can’t be faithful if you think only of yourself.
You think fidelity is possible? he asked.
In a translator or a man? I said before I realized what I was saying.
Either, he replied. Both.
Andi was making a show now of picking up her good school dresses one by one with two fingers and letting them drop, like smelly garbage, into the give-away pile.
I shook my head at her and crossed the living room to the study.
You mean absolute fidelity? I asked, as I sat on the loveseat. Pure translation, pure unwavering love? Of course not. There’s always a rupture, always an abandonment. The translated one is always betrayed.
Yes, he said. I am reading this essay — how you put it — of the traduttore/traditore.
I blushed. He was referring to the essay, published when I quit grad school, in which I railed about the impossibility of translation, the age-old notion that she who translates is both translator and traitor. I waited for the obvious: If you hate Dante and you don’t believe in translation, why did I hire you? Instead, he said, And why you think he do this, Miss Greene?
This?
Why you think he not get close to Beatrice?
Is it important?
To me, yes it is.
I think he cares more about his Beatrice poems than he does about Beatrice. He cares about art, not love. Vita Nuova is not a romance, it’s a manifesto explaining Dante’s shift from lyric to narrative.
I think is not this. He not get close to Beatrice because he is fearful, as you say. Of rupture, abandonment, betrayal. Is simple.